Civil War
Let’s go back in time a little bit. It’s the fall of 1865, three months after the last Confederate troops surrendered in Texas. The Civil War is over – like it or not, the Union is reunited and the nation is moving forward. Reconstruction troops occupy many parts of the former Confederacy, there to guarantee that the Rebellion, the Insurrection of 1861, remains over.
But what if Jefferson Davis, former President of the Confederacy, instead of being held for treason in leg irons at Fortress Monroe, was allowed to go from town to town and speak in favor of the Rebellion? What if instead of moving on from the Insurrection, the more than 600,000 dead, the four years of brother against brother and father against son, we allowed the leaders of the Confederacy to continue to preach for their cause?
It would have made no sense. It would have denigrated the ultimate sacrifice made by the Union dead. Even the departed Lincoln, with the final words: “With malice towards none, with charity for all…” recognized that victory required recognition of the victors, and acceptance by the defeated.
MAGA Mailing
Somehow, I ended up on the mailing list of an organization called “Save America”, a joint fundraising political action committee along with another title, “Make America Great Again”. It says it’s not authorized by any candidate, but it’s website is donaldjtrump.com. This is the Trump campaign, of 2020. It continues, because there are huge financial gains to be made by “campaigning”, whether Trump ever intends to run for President again or not. There are Trumpian bills to be paid, and many still willing to donate.
Here are Mr. Trump’s bullet points:
- Hydroxychloroquine works
- The China Virus came from a Chinese Lab
- Hunter Biden’s laptop was real
- Lafayette Square was not cleared for a photo op
- The Russian Bounties story was fake
- We did produce vaccines before the end of 2020, in record time I might add
- Blue state lockdowns didn’t work
- School should be reopened
- Critical Race Theory is a disaster for our schools and our country
- Our Southern Border security program was unprecedentedly successful.
Ignoring History
It’s like the whole history of our nation from November of 2020, through the inauguration of Joe Biden in January of 2021, didn’t happen. It’s as if Jefferson Davis was debating the Constitutionality of secession after the War was done. (Jefferson Davis WAS anxious to continue that debate, and hoped to do so in his treason trial. Instead, he ultimately was allowed to leave US custody on $100,000 bail, and departed to Canada, until Andrew Johnson pardoned him in 1868).
The “Big Lie” of non-existent election fraud led to the Insurrection of January 6. But it’s not just that lie that empowers Donald Trump. It is a series of “little lies” that have been going on since that “Golden Escalator” moment in 2015. The “little lies” softened us up. We got so used to the lying, that we stopped calling them lies: they were “alternative facts”, and the New York Times had long conferences on using the word “lies” (NYT). They were afraid by using so often, it would lose impact. It did.
Little Lies
We became inured to the lies, overwhelmed by the number and volume and sheer audacity of them. We were told not to believe our own eyes and ears, to only believe what HE (in a godly, capital letter way) told us. And after five years, when HE came out with the “Big Lie”, and incited his followers to attempt to overthrow the Constitutional process of choosing the President, we weren’t ready. The shock of the battle of the Capitol didn’t really set in, until we watched it “live”.
And now we are told again to not believe our own eyes and ears. And the “little lies” continue too. The former President’s list is still full of them. By the numbers:
- Hydroxychloroquine still doesn’t work for COVID (National Institutes of Health)
- We still don’t know how the COVID-19 virus began (Washington Post)
- Lafayette Square was cleared moments before Trump spoke (Washington Post). (An inspector general report that the Park Police only cleared it to install fences never looked at the roles of the Attorney General, Secret Service or other agencies in the park “clearing”.
- Lockdowns saved lives (Health Feedback).
The others – it’s hard to factcheck Hunter Biden’s laptop to a non-opinionated source – unless you use the New York Post, and the Russian Bounty story factuality is still undetermined.
Credit where credit is due: Operation “Warp Speed” did produce the vaccine quickly (though Pfizer didn’t get any of the research money) (NPR).
Fortress Monroe
But the “little lies” continue to dilute our world of facts. And the “Big Lie” that led to the attack on the US Capitol and the constitutional process, remains a “fact” for many. Unlike Jefferson Davis, Donald Trump is still selling it to his followers, like a dealer to his junkies.
Fortress Monroe is still available.
